(At Luohu there's a new turnstyle after passport control for scanning visas; perhaps a fingerprint scanner will be added.)

Let it not be forgotten why Americans can not get visas on arrival in China, such as the five-day Shenzhen visa at Luohu: because the Chinese government blocked those visas for Americans in 2004 in a fit of pique over America fingerprinting visa applicants.

(At Luohu there's a new turnstyle after passport control for scanning visas; perhaps a fingerprint scanner will be added.)

Those things scan the passport page, not the visa. And they are designed in a way that hard cover passports cannot be inserted - you need to completely fold out the plastic page. There will be a lot of passport pages breaking off at those turnstiles.

I'm talking about a set of turnstyles installed in the past few weeks at Luohu, right behind the immigration desks. There were no signs up as to the procedure, but the fellow standing there took my passport and -- I'm pretty sure -- turned to the visa page, put it down on a scanner plate on the turnstyle, a light flashed as the page was photographed, and I passed through the turnstyle. Nothing to be inserted: just put the page on the scanner.

I'm talking about a set of turnstyles installed in the past few weeks at Luohu, right behind the immigration desks. There were no signs up as to the procedure, but the fellow standing there took my passport and -- I'm pretty sure -- turned to the visa page, put it down on a scanner plate on the turnstyle, a light flashed as the page was photographed, and I passed through the turnstyle. Nothing to be inserted: just put the page on the scanner.

(These aren't a substitute for passport control, but a second check.)

Yes, we are talking about the same things. Also remember no instructions whatsoever and many puzzled travelers standing around. One of the attendants took a picture of my buddies passport cover (the outside, no personal info) with his iphone, apparently he had never seen one from Serbia before

And I remember the passport page was indeed scanned because I was afraid my passport would break (again) in the process of bending it like that. The scanner has some sort of "cover", which the passport slides under but doesn't fit the hardcover style passports. If you have a HK, CN or US passport you wouldn't have that problem.